


Courtship Behaviour

by matchsticks_p (matchsticks)



Category: Fall Out Boy
Genre: Fluff, Humour, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-03-28
Updated: 2010-03-28
Packaged: 2017-10-08 09:26:25
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,170
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/75235
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/matchsticks/pseuds/matchsticks_p
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Pete hits on Patrick, in the most literal sense possible.  Patrick is confused.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Courtship Behaviour

Pete had been smacking him an awful lot lately.

Patrick let it slide, at first, because he figured it was just some Pete phase that would pass. But it didn't pass—oh no. In fact, it escalated. Pete began to not only swat his shoulder when they talked, but also punch his arm after a joke, shove him lightly when he passed by, _and_ stomp on his heels when they walked. Patrick was getting just a tiny bit annoyed.

But it was Pete, and Patrick was used to letting him get away with murder, so he wasn't quite sure how to approach him about stopping the violence. He decided to talk to the other guys first.

He managed to corner Joe and Andy on the bus one day, while Pete was in the bathroom. "What the hell is up with Pete lately?"

"What do you mean?" Joe asked, not even looking up from his magazine.

"What, you haven't noticed? He's been hitting me, like, twelve times a day. Did I do something?" Joe and Andy shared some sort of knowing look that didn't escape Patrick's notice. "What?"

Andy gave a weird giggle and ran away to the bunk area without answering his question, which was, oooookay, almost as odd as Pete's behaviour. Patrick stared first at Andy's retreating back, then at Joe. Joe put down his magazine. "Patrick, my man, you _must_ have done something."

"Uh…" So Pete was mad at him, then? But he didn't seem mad; the hitting was more playful than angry…right? Oh god, was Pete mad at him? Pete had never been mad at him, ever. "Do you think I should apologize?" Patrick asked worriedly.

A corner of Joe's lips twitched upwards, but he quickly smothered it to say with all seriousness, "No, I totally think you should keep it up. Whatever you're doing, it's driving him _crazy_."

Patrick failed to see how continuing to drive Pete crazy would improve the situation. Besides, how could he keep it up if he didn't even know what he'd been doing? Before he could question Joe some more, though, Pete pranced out of the bathroom.

"Hey guys…whatcha talking about?" he asked, bouncing on the balls of his feet and repeatedly flicking Patrick's ear to get his attention.

Patrick didn't know what to say, so he just didn't say anything. Unfortunately, Joe didn't say anything either, and there was just a long, awkward silence until Pete cleared his throat.

"Right. You guys are weird," he said. The irony of that statement wasn't lost on Patrick, but he didn't say anything. He didn't want Pete to be mad at him. Or madder at him, if he was already mad. Was he mad?

Pete, whose attention span had long expired and moved on to something else, picked up a notebook lying around on the floor. "I wrote some new stuff, Patrick! Do you wanna see it?"

Patrick was about to say yes, but then Pete whacked him with the notebook. Hard. Patrick turned wide, wide eyes to Joe, silently mouthing "What did I do?"

Joe valiantly tried (and failed) to mask his laugh with a cough, and then ran to the back to join Andy. The door to the bunk area slammed. It didn't really mask the sound of Joe and Andy laughing like deranged hyenas, though.

"Um…"

"So…"

Neither Patrick nor Pete knew what to say to each other. They moved to sit down on the couch. For the next few minutes, not a sound stirred the bus…except Andy and Joe's screeching laughter slowly dying down. Patrick shifted uncomfortably. Pete twiddled with the metal coil on his notebook. He gently bumped Patrick's foot with his toes.

"Are you mad at me?" Patrick blurted out.

Pete looked at him. "What? No! Why would I be mad at you?"

"It's just that you keep hitting me, and you never used to hit me before, you only used to hit people who said mean stuff to me, and now I'm the one getting hit, so that must mean you're mad at me, but I wasn't sure if you were at first, so I asked Joe if it was because I did something wrong, and Joe said I must have done something, and he and Andy both know what I did, but I don't know what I did, and neither of them will tell me, they just keep laughing at me, and now I'm scared that you're gonna stay mad at me if I don't fix it, but how can I fix it if I don't even know what I did?" Patrick clapped his hand over his mouth. Therein lay the reason he never liked to talk much—once he started, he didn't quite know how to stop.

Pete blinked. Patrick doubted he even understood any of that. He wished he could talk like a coherent person. He tried again. "So, are you mad at me?"

"No. I like you."

Oh. Finally, it all made perfect sense—no, wait. "What?"

"I have the biggest fucking crush on you. You'd think that'd be obvious, because I've been dropping hints since FOREVER, but they were all completely lost on you. So I decided to make it even more obvious for you, but apparently that was lost on you too, because you can't read signals like a normal human being," Pete huffed.

Patrick stared at him. What. The. Fuck. "What are you, in grade two?! Beating me up means you like me?!"

"Well, I had already tried everything else! You were so dense that I had to take drastic measures!"

Patrick took a break from the yelling to pout at being called dense. Pete chewed on his lip nervously. "So…uh…do you like me?" he asked.

Really, Pete had absolutely no right to call him dense, because if he couldn't tell that Patrick was infatuated with him, then he wasn't all that bright either, was he? "Yes, Peter, I like you."

Pete grinned. "Good! I like you too."

There was a brief period of silence, during which Joe and Andy could be heard giggling through the door once more. And then Patrick suddenly realized that, what the hell? He had put up with two months of physical abuse just so they could declare that they were in like with each other?!

He grabbed Pete and kissed him. With lots and lots of tongue.

When they broke for air, Pete crowed in a delighted voice, "See? The hitting worked! I finally got through to you!"

Patrick rolled his eyes. "Yeah, well, next time you like someone, you should just say something, the way mature adults do, you loser."

Pete smirked at him. "What do you mean, next time?"

Huh? …Oh, wait. "Only, there won't ever be a next time again, because you're only allowed to like me now."

Pete beamed at him and then hit his knee for good measure, but Patrick didn't really think that was necessary, because he'd finally gotten the message.

-end  


**Author's Note:**

> first posted to LiveJournal on 2006-Feb-03


End file.
